


The Four Loves

by RembrandtsWife



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Background Relationships, Conversations, Friendship, Gen, Pie, Slice of Life, there must be pie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-08
Updated: 2017-02-08
Packaged: 2018-09-22 19:31:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 512
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9622403
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RembrandtsWife/pseuds/RembrandtsWife
Summary: Eros, philia, agape, storge. Or, Shitty explains it all for you.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the prompt "friend/team love". Check, Please! is the creation of Ngozi Ukazu, to whom I am extremely grateful.

"Eros, agape, philia, storge," Shitty proclaimed, looking up from his philosophy textbook.

Ransom and Holster looked up at each other, then at Shitty. Lardo, her feet in Shitty's lap as she sketched out ideas for her next project, tilted her head without looking up.

It was Jack, who had been watching tape while Bitty half-snoozed in his lap, who turned his head and said, "The four classical Greek words for love."

"Dingdingdingdingding! That's correct, Mr. Zimmermann!" Shitty leaned back and stretched, arms raised and fists curled. "Now, can you tell me what they mean?"

"They all mean 'love'," Jack replied, deadpan, and kissed Bitty's cowlick. Bitty muttered something.

"BRRRRZZZT! I'm sorry, that is not the correct answer." Shitty lifted Lardo's feet off his lap and gave her a questioning glance before heading to the refrigerator. "How the hell did you even know what those words mean, Jacky?"

Jack paused the tape and shifted Bitty around. "Because you told me about them in freshman year. You were high at the time." He scratched his chin. "I guess I was, too?"

Lardo snorted. Ransom threw down his mechanical pencil and pushed back from the table. "So what do they mean, bro?" He elbowed Holster, who nodded. Ransom went to the pass-through and cut two slices of the chocolate pecan pie, topping both with fresh whipped cream before putting one slice in front of his co-captain and the other next to his notebook.

"Well, eros is sexual love, erotic love, obviously." Shitty took a long pull of his beer and belched. "Whereas philia is friendship, or devotion--it's in English words like philanthropy and philosophy and philology."

"Yeah, but also in necrophilia and pedophilia," Lardo observed. She turned over a fresh page in her sketchbook and began covertly sketching Jack and Bitty.

"Agape is, well, the early Christians used it for divine love. It's disinterested love, not impersonal, exactly, but--" Shitty took another swig of beer and pondered while swishing it around in his mouth. "Love that wants the best for someone without necessarily getting anything out of it, or out of the other person."

"Like ch's'd," Holster chimed in, through a mouthful of pie. He wiped his mouth and repeated the words. "Like chesed. It's a Hebrew word in the Tanakh, means mercy, care, loving-kindness."

"Yeah, that sounds right."

"If eros is looking up to someone, seeing them as ideal," Jack glanced at Bitty and everyone else looked away from his smile, "then agape is looking out for someone, taking care of them."

"And the last one?" Ransom prompted, running one finger around his empty plate to catch the last smears.

"Storge is, like, affection. Natural attachment. Parents and children, family members, feel storge for one another." Shitty drained his beer. "Hopefully."

"Oh!" Bitty's surprised tone cut through what anyone else might have started to say. "Did I fall asleep, Jack? I'm so sorry, y'all." He slid off Jack's lap, found his feet, and stretched.

"It's okay, Bits." Jack resettled himself in the armchair, watching Bitty amble toward the bathroom. "We're all friends here."

**Author's Note:**

> I am [rembrandtswife](rembrandtswife.tumblr.com) on Tumblr, and [samwellalumna](samwellalumna.tumblr.com) is my CP sideblog.


End file.
